


tell me about your despair, yours, and i will tell you mine

by anonymousAlchemist, emi_rose



Series: periapsis [1]
Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Gen, Implied/Referenced Suicide, References to Depression, Suicide Attempt, aka forgiveness is a lot of things to a lot of people, another postcanon lucretia and taako talk fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-27
Updated: 2017-12-27
Packaged: 2019-02-22 16:30:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,522
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13170786
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anonymousAlchemist/pseuds/anonymousAlchemist, https://archiveofourown.org/users/emi_rose/pseuds/emi_rose
Summary: Taako snaps his fingers sharply and the glasses appear on the table between them. He refuses to look at them — or at Lucretia — as they appear."I still fuckin' hate you, okay? Just because, just because we're sitting here and you're drinking my shitty moscato, that doesn't mean we're good, alright? cause we're not! we're not good!"“It’s not that bad.” Lucretia proves her point by taking a long drink of sweet wine.“It was four gold at Fantasy Costco,” Taako says. “And hey! fuck you! Stop trying to get me to talk with you! I’m onto your tricks, Madame Director.”“I’m in your pocket spa,” she retorts.“Yeah, well, it’s mine, and I was here first,” he says.





	tell me about your despair, yours, and i will tell you mine

**Author's Note:**

> PLEASE READ THE TAGS. this fic assumes _basically_ the worst mental states for both characters, and pulls absolutely no punches.  
>  emi wrote the lucretia bits, iz wrote the taako bits.

Taako snaps his fingers sharply and the glasses appear on the table between them. He refuses to look at them — or at Lucretia — as they appear. 

"I still fuckin' hate you, okay? Just because, just because we're sitting here and you're drinking my shitty moscato, that doesn't mean we're good, alright? cause we're not! we're not good!"

“It’s not  _ that _ bad.” Lucretia proves her point by taking a long drink of sweet wine.

“It was four gold at Fantasy Costco,” Taako says. “And hey! fuck you! Stop trying to get me to talk with you! I’m onto your tricks,  _ Madame Director. _ ” 

“I’m in  _ your _ pocket spa,” she retorts. 

“Yeah, well, it’s mine, and I was here first,” he says.

“If you don’t want me here, I can go,” she says, starting to stand up warily, mindful of old wounds only just starting to scab. 

Taako shrugs. He curls up smaller in his chair. “Whatever, m’dude. Do what you want, ain’t no skin off my back either way. S’not like you ever do anything else.”  

“Are you calling me inconsiderate?” Lucretia speaks through gritted teeth, and she’s tired of having the same fight over and over, tired of acquiescing and flaying her guilt out for the world to see in an aberrant attempt to repent. 

“I’m just calling it like it is,” he says. “Don’t tell me I’m wrong, cause I’m  _ not. _ ” 

He still isn’t looking at her. Taako reaches blindly with a hand to grab his glass. His knuckles are white, and he brings the wine to his lips. This whole situation is stupid. He wishes he hadn’t told Magnus to tell Lucretia that she could use the pocket spa. He wishes he had left, when she had come in while Taako was lounging. 

They haven’t really talked since he got his memories back.

She’s tried, sure. He’s rebuffed her at every instance, and even if he’s letting her use his shit, it’s not like he wants to  _ see  _ her while she’s using it. Lucretia is a lot of things to him. He prefers not to be confronted with that fact. 

“You’re the one who invited me here,” she points out, and she’s not wrong either. Her eyes glint and she sits back down, taking another long sip of wine. “You know what? Fine. I’m not going anywhere.” 

“Fine! Yeah! That’s one me! That one’s on Taako!” Taako says. “Cool! Great! I guess we’re gonna both sit here like a couple of chumps, then, aren’t we!” 

Lucretia stares into the bottom of her wineglass. “Look, I’m tired of this.” 

“Tired of what?” he says. Taako knows what she’s talking about. The silences when they see each other. His snippy comments. Her apologies. It’s all a venn diagram of awful. The wine leaves a bitter aftertaste in his mouth. He stands up. “Listen, fuck it. You can have the spa. Just, lemme know when you’re done, okay? Taako’s gonna, I’m just gonna go.” 

“Don’t give me that bullshit. You’ve spent long enough snapping at me but refusing to actually talk about anything, and I’m done trying to apologize if you’re not going to listen. It takes two to tango, Taako, and I’m done dancing.”

“Yeah, well you’re a shitty dancer,” he says, “and maybe I don’t wanna talk about how I feel with you right now! Maybe I, uh, kind of hate looking at your face? Just a little bit? Maybe sometimes cha’boy sees you and is like, ‘oh jeez, there’s Luce, wow, we sure did spend a hundred years with her trying to save the world before she fucked us over!’ And I know what you’re gonna say, you’re gonna be all ‘oh, Taako, I was trying to protect you all, Taako, I thought I could take all the blame and save the whole fucking multiverse all by myself, Taako, I thought  _ erasing your fucking sister _ would be a godsdamn kindness,’ but you know what? I don’t give a shit! You took everything from me! You took  _ Lup  _ from me! What’s the, what’s the fucking point of having a family if you just go erasing their memories at the first opportunity, huh?” 

He’s shaking. His face is pale, his hands are fists. He sits down again. “Fuck,” he says, and swipes a hand across his face. 

“I said I was done apologizing, and maybe I’m sick of seeing you too, especially since every goddamn time I see you you’re trying to start a fight, rehashing the same shit you’ve been mad about for months! What do you want from me? If you’ll recall, going back and changing things isn’t exactly an option, not that you’d take it anyways, since you seem to enjoy being righteously pissed nowadays. At least I admit to my mistakes!” Lucretia’s voice inches higher and she pauses, breathing heavily. “You can’t live your life being angry at me and never moving on. I don’t know what else you want from me or what I’m supposed to do.” 

“Can’t spend your life wanting to die, but you manage fine,” Taako bites out, raising his face from his hand. 

“Yeah, well, maybe I’ll stop wanting and start doing, that sound good to you?” she snaps back.

“That’s not what I meant,” he says. “For fuck’s sake, s’not like I don’t wanna die either, but I’m not runnin’ off any cliffs.” 

Lucretia reels, astonished. “You knew about that? Why didn’t you say something?”

“What the fuck was I supposed to say? Hey Luce, I think you mighta offed yourself on purpose? Think you walked off a cliff? I think you’re fucking lying, when you said it was an accident? I told Cap’nport, and I told Lulu, and I locked up my poisons and tried to keep an eye on you. Listen. I’m not saying it was the best option, but it was the Taako option,” he says. “I figured you didn’t wanna talk about it. And you didn’t do it again, so.” 

Taako shrugs, and his voice is subdued when he says, “I wasn’t good at this shit.” 

Lucretia is quiet for a long moment. “Thank you.” Her voice cracks. “Really. Thank you.” 

“Listen,” Taako says, bypassing her thanks entirely. “Just because I’m pissed at you doesn’t mean ya boy doesn’t want you around, okay? Like, you get that there’s no take-backs now, right?” 

She stretches, a fusillade of joints crack, and she murmurs assent. “For better or for worse, I suppose. I do miss being perpetually nineteen. Way less shit hurt back then.”

He pours them both more wine. 

“Least you’re legal now,” Taako quips. “It’s still weird as all hell that you’re old, y’know?” 

“Mm,” she murmurs, and squints at him. “Hang on. Since when are you trying to kill yourself?” 

“So you wanna check out the sauna?” Taako says loudly. “There’s a sauna in here.” 

“No, I want you to sit the fuck back down and talk about this. If you really must we can discuss it while roasting alive, but don’t think you’re going to avoid this conversation.”

Taako stands up again sharply and starts edging over to the entrance, talking all the while. 

“Uh, yeah, I can. Just watch me. Cha’boy is, uh,  _ leaving.  _ We’re not talking about this. This ain’t your problem, thug. No problemo. Everything’s cool, I’m just gonna go, you can keep the wine, good talkin’ to ya Luce, other than the part where we yelled at each other again, see you at the weddi —” 

“No. Sit.”

“You’re literally not my boss anymore,” he says, and keeps walking. 

“I miss you, Taako.” Her nostrils flare and he can’t see it, but she clenches her core muscles around her spine, steadying her courage. “Please.”  

“That’s a you problem,” he says, and if he bites his lip after he says that, she can’t see him, so it’s fine, everything’s fine. 

“I’m not kidding,” she says, and summons a shimmering sphere of rainbow light enclosing them. 

“Hey!” he yelps. He whirls on his feet to face her. “This is entrapment!  _ Prismatic Wall?  _ Luce, what the fuck?” 

“I told you. We need to talk, and since  _ apparently _ you’re repelled by emotional conversations like a damn magnet, this is what I got.”

“We, uh, most definitely do not need to talk,” Taako says. “You’re right. Cha’boy doesn’t do emotions, you dig? And this only lasts for, uhhhh ten minutes, and then I’m outta here, anyway. You’re just wasting spell slots.” He sits down on the floor, as close to the entrance as he can get. He crosses his arms. 

Lucretia sighs deeply. “I can’t believe I’m doing this,” she says, and casts Zone of Truth. “There.”

“Did you just  _ pull a Merle? _ ” Taako says. “I can’t believe you just pulled a Merle, well, no I can believe it, because you just cast a  _ level nine spell _ to keep me from ghostin’, and I don’t know why you’re goin’ to all this effort cause I’ve been a raging asshole even though I’m real tired of being mad at you but I can’t stop, and oh jesus fuck I failed the wisdom save, I have to stop talkin’, uh, I’m gonna shut up now.” 

He clamps his lips shut. He glares at her. 

She closes her eyes in an expression as familiar as his sister’s face, and swallows the barb that had come unbidden to her lips. After all, the truth will out.  “Asshole or not, I still care. Not that you believe me, but I never stopped caring, Taako.” 

Taako doesn’t speak for a long moment, hugging his knees against his chest. He looks back up at Lucretia. 

“If you wanna have this conversation so bad, we’re having it in the sauna. I wasn’t lyin’ about that one, I’m fucking exhausted and my joints hurt like a bitch.” 

Lucretia laughs sharply. “You’re tellin’ me. I didn’t appreciate eternal youth as much as I should’ve.” She waves a hand and her barrier fades away.

“Wonderland, am I right?” Taako says, standing up. He crosses the room, gesturing for Lucretia to follow him. “C’mon. There’s like, towels and swimsuits and shit.” 

She stands up, knees creaking audibly, and rolls her eyes. “Fuckin’ liches. Present company’s family excluded, of course.”

“They’re your family too,” Taako says inadvertently, as he rummages through a cupboard. “Aw, fuck. Did you have to zone of truth us?” 

He tosses her a swimsuit. “That’s your size. I’m gonna go change, meet you in the sauna in ten.” 

Lucretia raises an eyebrow. “Since when do you care about changing in front of me? You’re trying to sneak out.” She strips down efficiently, making no effort to hide the puckered scars that rake across her torso, three long scars that couldn’t have come from weapons. She’s used to them at this point, and touching her belly doesn’t bring with it the sharp memories, the flash of claws wreathed in black smoke, at least, not anymore.

“Oh, fuck you,” he says, but there’s no heat in it, and he stifles the comment he wants to make about her scars. Those are new — then again, they all have scars now. Taako shrugs his cape off to the floor, pulls off his shirt, his shorts. There’s a whole mess of scarring across his chest and stomach that matches hers. Adventuring is not kind. He pulls on his swim trunks. 

“You good?” Lucretia asks, not sure of the sense in which she means her question.

“Eh,” Taako says, and walks through the entrance to the sauna. He’s fine, physically. “You coming?” 

Lucretia catches up and pushes open the door. The sauna smells like cedar and sandalwood, and the steam spills out, dense enough to almost completely hide the low benches that line the walls. She lowers herself onto a warm seat and sighs in relief. 

“‘Eh’ isn’t an answer. Really. Are you good?” she asks, hoping that she’s needling him enough to respond but not enough to start up the same fight they always fall into. 

Taako is lying across the adjacent bench, face down on a towel. He turns his head so that he can look at her with one eye, before closing it again. The heat feels good against his skin, but it’s making him feel every ounce of exhaustion. 

“I dunno,” he says. “I’m fine, I think. Things are good.” 

Lucretia mumbles to herself, and another zone of truth fills the sauna. “Really? You’re fine? ‘Cause I’m not.” She smooths a towel over the bench and lays down, mirroring him, heart pounding. 

“It’d be weird if you were,” Taako says. “Saving the world takes a lot outta ya.” 

Lucretia huffs in amusement. “That’s one way of putting it. Being alone after all that is worse, though.”

Taako nods fractionally. “Yeah. You see the others once in a while?” 

She hums noncommittally. “Sometimes.” She figures it’s not technically a lie, and the less he knows about who she does and doesn’t see and who she does and doesn’t sleep with, the better.

“So you and Maggie are hookin’ up again, then,” Taako surmises. Not that he  _ tried _ to get in everyone else’s business, it’s just, well, when your social circle is as small as theirs is, it’s hard  _ not  _ to know things. 

Lucretia sighs and gives him a sheepish glance. “I know you don’t approve,” she says, and pushes herself up on her elbows, “but I hope you at least understand and aren’t nasty to him on my account—” 

“Listen, Luce,” Taako cuts her off. “Your personal life? Not my problem. Who Maggie is boning? Deffo not my problem.” 

He sits up, grimacing as he stretches. Sweat is beading on his nose, and he scrubs his face with his towel. 

“He seems happier,” Taako admits. 

Lucretia sits up with a quiet groan, and draws her knees up to her chest - as far as they’ll go, at least, with the huge scars that mar her thighs. “I know he misses you, too,” she says quietly. 

“I see him, like, every week,” Taako complains. “How the fuck does he miss me! He keeps calling me, too. I can’t get rid of that big lunk.” 

“Yeah, well, neither can I,” she replies with a smile. 

Taako, against his will, smiles back, the barest upturn of his lip, close-mouthed. 

"Does he know you wanna beef it?" Taako says, and it's maybe a little meaner because he hates the way his heart feels in his chest. 

Lucretia’s heart, for her part, does a flip up into her throat. “Taako, I —” She pinches her lips together, an expression he’s seen a hundred thousand times, “that’s not something I talk about?”

“Not to throw your own advice back in your face, pumpkin, but that’s somethin’ you shoulda told him a long time ago,” Taako says, and if it’s not unkind, it’s not kind either. 

“It’s not bad advice, I’ll give you that much. But you understand why I can’t talk about that with him, right?”

“Why not?” Taako asks. 

Lucretia bites her tongue. “No one needs to know about that. It’s not like me dying would come as a surprise, and he’d just blame himself or something.” 

Taako snorts. 

“Have you  _ met _ Magnus? He’d find a way to blame himself no matter what, and um, Lucy? Honey? What the fuck do you mean by ‘me dying wouldn’t come as a surprise?” 

Taako is sitting straight up now, peering intently at Lucretia, as if he can dissect her through sight alone. 

“He’ll get over it, I’m sure,” she says quietly. “I’m...expendable, now.”

“Luce,” Taako says, and this is as sincere as he knows how to be. “You’re a lotta things — fucking nuts, huge asshole, total dorkazoid —  but you’re not  _ expendable.  _ You think your, your  _ death _ , it wouldn’t destroy the guy?”

He isn’t talking about Magnus anymore. She knows it.

“Like I said, he’ll get over it, and I’ll stop getting in the way of you two. And Davenport can come around again, and— ”

“Bullshit,” Taako says sharply. “First of all, you think we’re gonna let you get away with that? You don’t just get to  _ leave,  _ and Lup and Barold are fucking  _ reapers _ , Luce, it’s not like blasting your ass off the material plane gets you any leeway, I’ve seen the astral plane, and there’s just more  _ shit, _ and if you don’t think that we’d go fishin’ you’re, uh, completely wrong. S’not like you can just  _ get the fuck out, _ you know? There’s no gettin’ away from this whole life deal. So quit thinkin’ ‘bout it, cause you’re making cha’boy nervous.” 

Lucretia stares at him suspiciously. “You’ve thought a lot about this, for someone who thinks he’s fine.”

“I —” Taako says, and then shuts his mouth. “I don’t wanna talk about this, we’re talkin’ about  _ you.”  _

“ _ Taako _ .  _ What the fuck.” _ Her voice carries more than a hint of Madam Director, and she’s sitting up ramrod straight, steel in her spine and her soul. 

“I’m not gonna kill myself!” he says. “Alright? We good? Can we drop this, now?” 

“I don’t know,  _ are _ we good? Seems like we’re not!”

“I don’t know!” Taako says, all a rush. “I want us to be good, and I’m so godsdamn tired of being mad at you, but I can’t stop, and, and, it’s not like a  _ thing _ , okay? It’s not like a thing I’m trying to do, but I don’t know, okay? You heard it here first: idiot wizard doesn’t fucking know what’s happening.” 

“It most definitely is a  _ thing _ , though. We can’t be in the same room without practically starting a second Relic War, and you can’t just  _ stop being angry _ and think about someone else’s feelings for once!”

“And you can’t stop being a self-sacrificing human guilt trip, so I guess we’re even! You, you’re so wrapped up in your stupid self-flagellation, you know that? You think  _ I’m _ selfish? You’re the one who’s actually thinkin’ about kickin’ the bucket!” 

“As if you aren’t the one sending me on a guilt trip every time we’re in the same room!”

_ “You’re the one that broke my brain, _ ” Taako screams. “Okay! I just want to make one thing clear here! You, yeah, you, specifically you  _ fucked me up, _ okay? You fucked cha’boy up  _ real good _ , and you’re like my  _ sister _ , and you erased my  _ actual sister _ , and I’m mad at you, and you keep  _ pushing,  _ but none of that means  _ I don’t want you around,  _ okay?” 

He realizes he’s standing, now, arms trembling, looming over Lucretia’s seated figure. He sees her expression. He realizes that his eyes are wet, and not with steam. He sits down like a puppet with cut strings, right on the floor in front of her. Taako puts his head in his hands. They’re slick with sweat and steam. He doesn’t want to look at her expression. 

“Fuck you, I hate this,” he mumbles into his palms. 

This is the closest Lucretia’s felt to being eviscerated since Wonderland, and she reflexively holds on to the scar on her belly, puckered in at the edges thanks to her shoddy sewing skills. She stands up and takes a long look at the floor, ponders sitting down for a moment, then flares her nostrils, grits her teeth, and wipes angrily at her eyes. She nods sharply.

“You’re absolutely right,” she says, too calm. “I fucked you up. You should be mad. Tell everyone I tried.” Taako looks back up. Lucretia takes a deep breath and points at the wall directly behind her. A shimmering door appears. When Lucretia opens it, there is only a wall of flames on the other side, with the City of Brass barely visible through the smoke and ash. Taako’s eyebrows shoot up. 

“Oh no you —  _ IMPRISONMENT!”  _ he shouts, and a spectral chain springs between their left wrists, yanking Lucretia back as she tries to step forward. She pulls back with a surprising amount of strength and almost succeeds in pulling him through the portal with her. Flames lick far too close to their skin. 

Taako swears, and pulls her back toward him with all his strength, grabbing her shoulder with his free hand and crushing her against him, her back to the flames. He stumbles back, trying to drag her with him, but she resists. 

“If you’re going down, you’re dragging me down with you,” he says, between harsh breaths. The air in the sauna is heating beyond comfort. 

She curses and dismisses the portal. The sauna is immediately more habitable, but they are both dripping sweat. Lucretia rubs her wrist where the spectral restraint is cutting into it. 

“Can you  _ please _ let me out of this?” 

“You just tried to jump in a pit of fire,” Taako says flatly. “You don’t get a vote.” 

Lucretia scoffs. “Fine. But can we at least get out of this version of the plane of fire?”

“That was terrible,” Taako says, but he lets go of her shoulder. “Alright, spa time’s over.” 

He walks over to the door of the sauna, and Lucretia is forced to follow him. The door opens in a cloud of steam, into the spa antechamber, their wine still sitting unattended. 

Lucretia sits down heavily on a chaise, pulling Taako’s shoulder dangerously close to out of joint. “Why do you keep doing this?” she asks, almost plaintive.

“Doing what?” The air is cold after the hot steam room. Taako shivers, and sneezes. “Hey, hand me that towel, wouldja?” 

He gestures at the stack folded neatly by the chaise, nearer to Lucretia’s hand then his own. 

She hands him a towel wordlessly, without looking at him, and sighs. “All of this. Whatever we’ve been doing since…” she trails off, waving her hand aimlessly. 

“Well, if I remember correctly, and I’m pret-ty sure I do, this is mostly  _ your  _ doing,” Taako says, and he mostly sounds tired now, last vestiges of anger dissipated like the steam from his skin. He rubs the worst of the moisture from his body. He glances over at her. “So. I really wanna be wearing pants, and I’m pretty sure you wanna be wearing yours; do you promise not to go runnin’ if I uncuff us?” 

Lucretia runs her hands over the scars on her thighs and hums her agreement. “Pants sound good.” The ethereal restraints dissipate and she dresses in contemplative silence. “I’m well aware what is and isn’t my doing, Taako. What I can’t figure out, though, is what you  _ want _ from me. You don’t want apologies, you  _ apparently _ don’t want me to die, and you also don’t want to talk about it. What will be enough for you?”

Taako pulls his head through his shirt and stares at her. “I don’t want anything from you,” he says, bemused. 

“You don’t….want anything from me,” Lucretia repeats flatly. “So really, there’s no point to me sticking around.” 

“What do those two things have to do with each other?” Taako says, wrinkling his nose. He grabs her wrist. “C’mon.” 

Taako starts pulling Lucretia to the door of the Pocket Spa. 

“Hey! Where are you taking me?”

“Cha’boy needs somethin’ stronger than moscato, hon, and I don’t trust you,” Taako says, pulling her to the curtained-off exit. 

They pop out of the teeny pocket spa entrance, landing in Taako’s kitchen. It’s warm and light, lit by the late afternoon sun. Taako was supposed to start dinner by now, but, eh. He’ll figure something out later. He points sternly at Lucretia. 

“You, sit. No touchin’ shit.” 

Lucretia does as she’s told, carefully pulling out a chair at his lavishly appointed dining room table and settling. 

Taako pulls out a bottle of vodka, and mage-hands a carton of orange juice out of the fridge. He pours measures of both into two glasses — heavy on the liquor. He sets one of the glasses in front of Lucretia, and drains his entirely. 

“So, you wanna talk about it? Okay, talk about it. What the  _ fuck  _ was that whole— ” he gesticulates vaguely. “—fire deal about? Why the fuck does what  _ I  _ want matter? Yanno, I thought I had this whole sitch figured out but this? This is goin’ over Taako’s head. Did you just, did you just try to,” his voice trails off.  

She drains her glass while staring him dead in the eyes, a power move he recognizes from the countless times she’s been underestimated. 

“The Plane of Fire is outside of the Raven Queen’s jurisdiction,” she explains calmly. “And what you want —” her voice cracks “—what you want matters because I can’t live with myself until you forgive me.”

Taako stares back at her. She’s unblinking. He isn’t. He opens his mouth. Closes it. Opens it again.

“No,” Taako says, and he’s surprised that his voice is so strong, “No, okay, no,  _ you don’t get to put that shit on me _ ! Who the seven hells do you think I am, I’m not some, I’m not some fucking  _ priest _ , I’m not a  _ cleric, _ what the fuck does my forgiveness matter, huh? That’s, you don’t get to make your goddamn guilt my problem! Yeah I’ve got my problems with you, but they’re  _ my problems, _ alright, and I don’t care what you think, you don’t, you don’t get to  _ opt out  _ ‘cause one lousy stinkin’ elf doesn’t forgive you!” 

“I don’t --” Lucretia opens her mouth to speak, and Taako raises his palm. 

“No, fuck you, I’m not done! Also, you know what?  _ ZONE OF TRUTH, _ ” Taako says, letting the magic wash over him, loosening his tongue. “There! Now you know  _ I’m not fuckin’ playing,  _ Luce! Stop tryin’ to talk, I’m not done! You know what your problem is? You’re fucking selfish, you know that? And yeah. That’s coming from me. It doesn’t matter whether you can’t live with yourself! You keep living anyway! You think you get the easy way out? What the fuck do you think Mags is gonna do, if you’re gone? Whattabout Lup? Barry? The Bureau?  _ Angus?  _ What about me, huh? And yeah, cha’boys super pissed! You know that! But you know what? Maybe I never forgive you and, and, you need to goddamn learn how to live with that, Lucretia, because I don’t care where you try and go, I don’t care what you try and do, if you try and off it, cha’boy is comin’ after you. You think there’s anywhere you can go, where I can’t find you? You’re not gettin’ out of this one, because fuck you very much,  _ I’m not lettin’ you _ .” 

“You think I’m  _ selfish _ ?” she spits. “You think that I’m the one who needs to learn to move on? That’s rich, that’s really fucking rich coming from  _ you _ .” She seethes, chest heaving with spite. “What gives you the  _ right _ to, to say you won’t forgive me and that I can’t ask that from you? You wouldn’t know what guilt felt like if it came and kicked you in the head. I know I fucked up, and there’s nothing I can do to fix it, there’s nothing I can do to give you a decade of your life back, but I can’t live every day with that staring me in the face. I don’t need some kind of divine atonement, though I’m sure that’d be nice too, I need one goddamn reason that the world isn’t gonna be better off when I die!” She’s flushed with emotion, and she white-knuckles the empty glass in her hands.  

Taako is silent for a moment. He pours refills for both of them without getting up. Without looking up at her, he speaks, and this time, his voice is measured. 

“Yeah, I think you’re selfish. You know what your problem is, Lucretia? Well, you have a lotta problems, but here’s the big one: forgiveness has nothin’ to do with living,” Taako says. “You know, for the woman who saved the multiverse, you’re pretty dumb sometimes. You think just cause I haven’t forgiven you yet, doesn’t mean I don’t care about you?” 

She stares at him, dumbfounded. “That’s absolutely what it means. You — you’ve never hurt someone, let alone someone you care about? You’ve never made a mistake you can’t undo? You’ve never done something that, that rips you apart from the inside out, that you had to do, that was the right thing, but that you shouldn’t have done? You never tried to fix something that wasn’t fixable? You and I  _ both _ know that’s not true.” 

“Well no shit I have! I mean, look at me,” he gestures at himself. “Yeah, I’ve done some real fucked up shit, but it’s not like caring about someone and forgiveness are, are  _ mutually inclusive. _ ” 

“You have  _ no idea _ what I went through for you.” She takes a shuddering breath. “You see this?” She pulls up her shirt and lays bare some of the scars that rip across her torso. “This is because I refused to forget you.” She lets the fabric drop. “Don’t you get it?”

“Absolutely not,” Taako says. “I mean, that’s heartwarming as all fuck, but it’s not like, Luce, y’can’t balance this shit out like that, that’s not how any of this works.” 

“That absolutely  _ is _ how it works. I can’t believe you, you don’t think you can make up for something? You don’t think someone can earn forgiveness? How do you live with yourself, then?” 

Taako shakes his head. 

“How the fuck do you weigh someone’s life, huh? Y’know, when I was in Wonderland, I  _ basically  _ condemned a buncha dudes to death. I kinda killed forty people c-cause I was an asshole to my assistant. Fuck, me and the boner squad fucked Phandolin  _ all  _ the way over by not gettin’ the gauntlet back. And we left like, a hundo worlds to die, me and you, Luce, me and you and the rest of us, cause we were tryin’ to save the multiverse. I’m not good people, but sometimes, sometimes there aren’t any good options,” he says. He’s staring at his cup, which he’s drained the second time. “Y’know? Tryin’ to balance it out…” 

He shivers, and doesn’t seem to realize he has. He doesn’t feel bad, he should feel bad, the person he used to be would feel bad. There’s a lotta wrong he’s done, and he shoves it all back in his head. 

Lucretia finishes her drink and leans back in her chair, pensive. She remembers. She remembers the broken look on Magnus’s face, Taako adrift without even a memory of his sister to anchor him,  _ Davenport _ , and it’s almost too much. 

“You know, it’s like what you said, about how sometimes there’s no good decisions or bad decisions, just decisions…” She shakes her head. “But, I don’t know, you’re right. We left so many people to die and there’s nothing we can do about it. And me, well. You met Cam. You won’t let me forget everything I did wrong.” She makes a quiet noise halfway between a sob and a laugh and puts her face in her hands. “Are any of us really innocent?”

“Well,” Taako says, and his voice is sardonic. “We saved the world. That oughtta count.” 

“You’d think we could focus on that, don’t you? I don’t know about you, but every time I close my eyes I see all the people we weren’t able to save.”

“I just try not to think about it too much,” Taako admits. “Lup keeps askin’ me about what happened. I don’t know what to tell her, yanno? Like, hey Lulu, guess what? Without you, cha’boy’s  _ hot garbage. _ ”  

Lucretia nods, hangs her head, and moves to take a drink, but realizes her drink is empty again. “You’re not the only one who’s garbage without Lup.” She stands to mix another drink, forgetting Taako’s edict to not touch anything. 

Taako rests his head on his forearms. He watches her pour juice and liquor. They used to do this, he remembers, ‘cept with more gossipin’ and less self-flagellation, and they would sit next to each other on the couch in the lounge and he would rest his head on her shoulder. 

“Y’re not garbage,” he says. “You just care too much.” 

“You’re not garbage either, you just don’t show how much you care,” she says, hands him a full glass, and plops down on the couch. 

“I don’t–” he starts to say, and then the fizzy pinpricks of magic tingle on his tongue. “Aw, dunk. I played myself.” He sits up, sips his drink, frowns at her without any heat.  

Lucretia laughs, and he realizes he’s missed her laugh and the smile that accompanies it. “I know you care. Would it kill you to talk about it sometimes?” 

“If we weren’t in a zone o’ truth, I’d say ‘absolutely,’” Taako quips. “But since we are, I’m just gonna say ‘no comment.’” He stands, stumbles a little, and steps over to collapse on the couch next to Lucretia. “It’s easier not to talk about it,” he mumbles. 

She wraps a tentative arm around him and holds him close. “Even zone of truth couldn’t make you, huh?” 

“Mmmnope,” Taako says, and pretends that he’s not tucking his head on her shoulder. “But, er,  _ listen. _ I’d miss you, if you weren’t around. I mean that one.” 

**Author's Note:**

> liner notes up @[here](https://emi--rose.tumblr.com/post/169027071992/tell-me-your-despair-yours-and-i-will-tell-you)!  
> iz is @[anonymousalchemist](http://anonymousalchemist.tumblr.com/) and emi @[emi--rose](https://emi--rose.tumblr.com/)  
> title is from mary oliver's _wild geese_.  
>  thank u for reading!


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